Filthy Hospital, a breeding ground for corruption

Filthy Hospital, a breeding ground for corruption!!!

Ezekiel Morake

Iconic Queen II hospital in the Maseru CBD, along Kingsway road is a shadow of its former self.

Many Basotho from all walks of life still go there in huge numbers to get health service for their different ailments and to get medical certificates. The surroundings at Queen II hospital are a total eyesore and pose many health and welfare risks to the patients and health workers at the hospital. Many wards are dilapidated, broken doors, falling ceilings and broken windows are what describes the situation at Queen II hospital. The grass around the wards has grown so much that is over knee high making it conducive for snakes to roam around freely and attack patients unaware.

The hospital was re-opened after its closure in 2012 with the suggestion that a shopping complex was going to be built at the site but many people complained that the services at Queen Mamohato hospital (Tshepong) were expensive making it hard for them to seek medical help there. And Tshepong as is affectionately known was bedeviled by shortage of staff and mass exodus of the nursing staff. Queen II was then re-opened and the public was told that a new hospital was going to be built, turning it a District hospital instead of a national one as it was before.

Soon or later Queen II is going to be demolished and the health services would be offered at a designated Bedco Complex near Maqalika dam in Ha-Thamae.  But currently Queen II hospital is a haven of corruption, as some of the Cleaners are purported to be selling fake sick-leaves to unscrupulous workers and a consultant Surgeon performing autopsy at the hospital has opened his Spaza pathology enterprise charging bereaved families R1500.00 in the hospital premises for performing post-mortem to the corpse.

Acting Medical Superintendent, Dr. Alexander Mojela said the conditions at Queen II where he is the senior most doctors were worrisome and needed to be fixed urgently. He said that some of the people working at the hospital didn’t care much about the hospital and were there to just draw salary from the hospital. Mojela said the Principal Secretary of the Health department was aware of the situation and had even intervened to stop the selling of fake sick-leaves at the out-bounds of the hospital.

“What is happening at the hospital is that there is a general negligence. I don’t know what is happening here. We have cleaners who only clean where people can see. After they have swept the wards and offices, they go outside the hospital to sell fake sick-leaves to the people and other medication. I even asked the P.S (Principal Secretary) to intervene as the situation was getting out of control. While I was working in Quthing we had engaged the cleaning services of a private company but here we have people who have been hired from their constituencies and cannot be reprimanded as they have political protection,” said a concerned Mojela.

He said that the hospital was going to be demolished and in its place a new one was going to be built. Mojela said a big part of the hospital had been shutdown yet a few services were still open for out-patients. Mojela added that a post-mortem service was still being carried out by a consultant, Doctor Moorosi whom he did not know how much he charged for his autopsy services.

“When I arrived here from Quthing I was told that doctors had refused to perform pathology work claiming that they were not paid for it. And the hospital had allowed Dr. Moorosi as a consultant to do the work in the hospital laboratory with the police. There are only two qualified pathologists in the country,” he said.

However, Mojela did not dispute the fact that there was a tinge of corruption playing itself out for desperate families to have their loved ones buried on time by paying for the post-mortem service as they could not do anything if the post-mortem had not been performed on the dead person.

A clandestine investigation conducted by this newspaper has revealed that Dr. Moorosi together with Cops and a man working at Lesotho Revenue Authority (LRA) are in cahoots using a dilapidated building at Queen II hospital to render their corrupt service to the corpses of families who want to bury their family member on time. On normal working days a corpse would be booked to investigate the cause of death for free so that the post-mortem report could be released for the issuance of Death Certificate and for closure of insurance policy.

A post-mortem report is necessary for the drawing up of a death certificate from the National Identity office at Maseru Mall. The other reason is when the deceased has been insured, so the insurance companies would require a death certificate which cannot be issued on time if the post-mortem report has not been made.

This situation has created a fertile ground for Dr. Moorosi and his colleagues to take advantage of the grieving families who are desperate to bury the deceased on time. The exercise has become a lucrative business undertaking by these men at Queen 2. The laboratory in which this autopsy is being conducted is filthy and has no windows and the surroundings are covered in a long grass, making it scarier to ordinary people.

People who spoke to this newspaper on condition of anonymity revealed their harrowing experiences, that the same doctor often misdiagnose the cause of death, for instance when a Khubetsoana school girl was killed by a car, the doctor said the student’s death was caused by Tuberculosis. Another said his relative who passed away, the doctor said his cause of death was head injury yet the person had suffered from stomach cancer.

In the meantime, Police Spokesman Superintendent Mpiti Mopeli said police authorities have not received any complaint from the public that they were being swindled of their hard earned money to pay for post-mortem. But said that there was no law preventing an individual to seek a post-mortem from a private doctor just like when someone could hire a private investigator to help with the case.

“Post-mortem is part of the evidence that the police do to gather information for the case they are dealing with for a possible prosecution of a suspect of a crime. However, the police have a contract with the Pathologist to work on the corpses where the police a investigating a crime and that doctor is being paid by the police after submitting a claim for the number of corpses he has worked upon. The public don’t have to pay a single cent for a post-mortem if the case is handled by the police,” said Mopeli.